26077: Allouard (reply) 25970: Vedrine: Haitians And The Mith About Blacks Dont Read (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: Philippe Allouard <allouard@libertysurf.fr>

Thanks to Mr. Vedrine for making the point this clear.
I would just add that:

DESIRE for education, speaking of the parents AND the pupils,  is incredibly
stronger in Haiti than in Africa or France, according to teachers having
comparative experience of those places.
I nevertheless experienced two other things (at least) being against reading
in Haiti:

1/ Usually, even in good schools, reading is used to read teacher's notes,
or one's notes, and school handbooks, and NOT literature.
Lessons are about what to think (hem... 'what to SAY' seems more
appropriate) about this author or this book, and not about reading it.
Pupils learn who they should name the best Haitian poet [excuse my
forgetting his name], but they NEVER happen to read a single verse he wrote
(You can add to this that when studying a specific complete piece, it is
more often from Racine than from Jacques Roumain or Danny Laferiere, and
this does not help the pupils to grab something from their study).

2/ Many pupils have vision problems and reading results in terrible
headaches after half an hour: they ignore they just need medical glasses and
quit reading even if you provide them with books and even if they have the
desire to read. Health programs should address also the question of vision
and not only parasitic and infectious diseases... Lack of electricity
probably does not help as studies are done with "bobech" or under public or
private external lights.

Regards,
              Philippe